¹ McGovern, Charles, “Consumption and Citizenship in the United States, 1900–1940,” in Strasser, Susan, McGovern, Charles, and Judt, Matthias, eds., Getting and Spending: European and American Consumer Societies in the Twentieth Century (Washington, D.C., 1998), 37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar This collection, dedicated to the memory of advertising historian Roland Marchand, draws together many significant explorations of consumer culture in this time period.

² By no means had Americans overcome deep ethnic, racial, and regional differences in their own self-definitions as consumers, but they had spoken of their purported homogeneity in referring to themselves. On the internal divisions and definitions, see Horowitz, Daniel, The Morality of Spending: Attitudes Toward the Consumer Society in America, 1875–1940 (Baltimore, 1985)Google Scholar; Bogle, Donald, Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies, and Bucks: An Interpretive History of Blacks in American Films (New York, 1989)Google Scholar; Kern-Foxworth, Marily, Aunt Jemima, Uncle Ben, and Rastus: Blacks in Advertising: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow (Westport, Conn., 1994)Google Scholar; Bird, Elizabeth S., ed., Dressing in Feathers: The Construction of the American Indian in American Popular Culture (Boulder, Colo., 1996)Google Scholar; Scanlon, Jennifer, ed., The Gender and Consumer Culture Reader (New York, 2000)Google Scholar; Matt, Susan J., Keeping Up With the Joneses: Envy in American Consumer Society, 1890–1930 (Philadelphia, 2003).CrossRefGoogle Scholar On the ways in which consumption defined the consumer as decidedly American, see Charles McGovern, who states that consumption was “the distinct heritage and privilege of living in the United States. Consumption was in effect the national folkways,” “Consumption and Citizenship,” p. 48.

³ Barnet, Richard J. and Cavanagh, John, Global Dreams: Imperial Corporations and the New World Order (New York, 1994), 22.Google Scholar On the ways in which the state is implicated in the increasing consumer culture, see Jacobsen, Matthew Frye, Barbarian Virtues: The United States Encounters Foreign Peoples at Home and Abroad (New York, 2000)Google Scholar; George Lipsitz, “Consumer Spending as State Project: Yesterday's Solutions and Today's Problems,” in Strasser et al., Getting and Spending, 127-47. For histories of advertising in the United States, see Fox, Richard Wightman and Lears, T. J. Jackson, The Culture of Consumption: Critical Essays in American History, 1880–1980 (New York, 1983)Google Scholar; Fox, Stephen R., The Mirror Makers: A History of American Advertising and Its Creators (New York, 1984)Google Scholar; Marchand, Roland, Advertising the American Dream: Making Way for Modernity (Berkeley, Calif., 1985)Google Scholar; Norris, James D., Advertising and the Transformation of American Society, 1865–1920 (New York, 1990)Google Scholar; Lears, T. J. Jackson, Fables of Abundance: A Cultural History of Advertising in America (New York, 1994)Google Scholar; Scanlon, Jennifer, Inarticulate Longings: The Ladies' Home Journal, Gender, and the Promises of Consumer Culture (New York, 1995).Google Scholar

⁴ See also Merron, Jeff, writing earlier in these pages, “Putting Foreign Consumers on the Map: J. Walter Thompson's Struggle With General Motors' International Advertising Account in the 1920s,” Business History Review 73 (Autumn 1999): 465–502.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Merron explored the ways in which J. Walter Thompson used quantitative research methods to secure its international development and to attract clients beyond General Motors. I complement Merron's work by situating this development further in the context of globalization. Together these two articles provide a fairly comprehensive examination of the work that allowed J. Walter Thompson, through its international endeavors, to become what Merron calls “the undisputed leader in agency billings” for roughly fifty years (p. 501).

⁵ Roberto C. Goizueta, “Globalization: A Soft Drink Perspective,” Executive Speeches, September 1989, 2, quoted in Barnet and Cavanagh, Global Dreams, 169.

⁶ Barnet and Cavanagh, Global Dreams, 14.

⁷ Ibid., 170.

⁸ Ibid., 169.

⁹ McLuhan, Marshall, The Global Village: Transformations in World Life and Media in the Twenty-first Century (New York, 1989).Google Scholar

¹⁰ Schaeffer, Robert K., Understanding Globalization: The Social Consequences of Political, Economic, and Environmental Change (Lanham, Md., 2003), 9.Google Scholar

¹¹ Alexander Stille, “Globalization Now, A Sequel of Sorts,” New York Times, 11 Aug. 2001.

¹² See O'Rourke, Kevin H. and Williamson, Jeffrey W., Globalization and History (Cambridge, Mass., 1999)Google Scholar; James, Harold, The End of Globalization: Lessons from the Great Depression (Cambridge, Mass., 2002).Google Scholar

¹³ See Wilkins, Mira, The Emergence of Multinational Enterprise: American Business Abroad from the Colonial Era to 1914 (Cambridge, Mass., 1970)Google Scholar, and The Maturing of Multinational Enterprise: American Business Abroad from 1914 to 1970 (Cambridge, Mass., 1974)Google Scholar; Jones, Geoffrey, The Evolution of International Business: An Introduction (London, 1996)Google Scholar; quote from Jones, p. 36.

¹⁴ According to Jones (pp. 29-30), the United Kingdom accounted for almost 50 percent of the world's foreign direct investment in 1914; the United States accounted for an additional 14 percent.

¹⁵ Wilkins, The Emergence of Multinational Enterprise, 191.

¹⁶ Charles Lovering, quoted in Jacobsen, Barbarian Virtues, 15.

¹⁷ Jacobsen, 17.

¹⁸ Ibid., 41.

¹⁹ Ibid., 51.

²⁰ Jones, The Evolution of International Business, 99, 36.

²¹ Moreno, Julio, Yankee Don't Go Home! Mexican Nationalism, American Business Culture, and the Shaping of Modern Mexico, 1920–1950 (Chapel Hill, 2003).Google Scholar

²² Barnet and Cavanagh, Global Dreams, 174.

²³ Printer's Ink (4 Nov. 1926): 196, quoted in Marchand, Advertising the American Dream, 31.

²⁴ Ibid., 32.

²⁵ “Here is the Lever, Archimedes,” n.d. Box 144, Bruce Barton Papers, Wisconsin State Historical Society, quoted in Marchand, 31.

²⁶ “J. Walter Thompson International,” 1952, 3, Information Center, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives, Duke University Library.

²⁷ “J. Walter Thompson International,” 1952, 2.

²⁸ A. L. Reinitz, “RESEARCH: The Approach to Export Advertising,” Export Advertiser (Nov. 1929): 30.

²⁹ Newsletter, 1 Nov. 1927, quoted in Merron, Jeffrey, “American Culture Goes Abroad: J. Walter Thompson and the General Motors Export Account, 1927–1933” (Ph.D. diss., University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 1991), 19.Google Scholar See also Merron, “Putting Foreign Consumers on the Map.”

³⁰ “J. Walter Thompson International,” 1952, 3.

³¹ Ibid. By 1928, the company had offices in London, Paris, Berlin, Antwerp, Madrid, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Alexandria, and Port Elizabeth.

³² “J. Walter Thompson International,” 1952, 3-4.

³³ “How Well Do You Know Your JWT'ers?” 2 Apr. 1951, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

³⁴ “How Well Do You Know Your JWT'ers?” 18 Oct. 1948, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

³⁵ Stanley Resor, “Introduction,” News Bulletin, no. 135 (July 1928): 1-2, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

³⁶ “A Few Facts About Our Work Abroad,” News Bulletin, no. 136 (Nov. 1928): 16-19, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

³⁷ Reinitz, “RESEARCH: The Approach to Export Advertising,” 30.

³⁸ Nye, David, Image Worlds: Corporate Identities at General Electric, 1890–1920 (Cambridge, Mass., 1985), 178.Google Scholar

³⁹ “J. Walter Thompson International,” 1952, 6.

⁴⁰ Ibid., 1.

⁴¹ Clement Watson expanded on this idea: “The development of American advertising methods abroad is going hand in hand with that of American export,” wrote one employee. “The two are closely linked together in organization, in method, and in achievement, and American advertising practice is beginning to exert its influence abroad as markedly in its sphere as are American sales and merchandising in theirs.” Clement H. Watson, “Markets are People—Not Places: A Few Thoughts on Export,” News Bulletin, no. 135 (July 1928): 21.

⁴² Henry C. Flower, letter to Stanley Resor, quoted in Merron, 10.

⁴³ Merron, “American Culture Goes Abroad,” 11.

⁴⁴ Representatives' meeting minutes, 8 Oct. 1929, 2-3, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁴⁵ “J. Walter Thompson International,” 4.

⁴⁶ West, Douglas C., “From T-Square to T-Plan: The London Office of the J. Walter Thompson Advertising Agency, 1919–70,” Business History 29 (Apr. 1987): 204.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴⁷ Merron, “Putting Foreign Consumers on the Map,” 501.

⁴⁸ Kreshel, Peggy J., “The ‘Culture’ of J. Walter Thompson, 1915–1925,” Public Relations Review 16 (Fall 1990): 80–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴⁹ J. W. Thompson International notebooks, 1928–1931, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁵⁰ Howard Henderson, “A Short History of the J. Walter Thompson Company,” 22 Jun e i960, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁵¹ Jacobsen, Barbarian Virtues, 38.

⁵² “Will the Automobile Break Down International Boundaries?” News Bulletin, no. 129 (Apr. 1927): 14, J. Walter Thompso n Company Archives.

⁵³ Harry Tipper, quoted in News Bulletin, no. 133 (Mar. 1928): 7, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁵⁴ Representatives' meeting minutes, 2 June 1931, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁵⁵ Arthur Farlow, staff meeting minutes, 21 Feb. 1934, 5, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁵⁶ Russell Pierce, staff meeting minutes, 14 July 1931, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁵⁷ “J. Walter Thompson International,” 1952.

⁵⁸ William B. Ricketts, “What Does South America Offer the American Advertiser?” News Bulletin, no. 135 (July 1928): 35, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁵⁹ Minutes of representatives' meeting, Aug. 1929, 14, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁶⁰ Erving Goffman, cited in Marchand, 48.

⁶¹ This concept follows on that of Goffman. Anthropologist Lorraine Kenny uses the concept of “insider-other” to describe those who are, arguably, both part of and not part of a particular culture; see Kenny, Lorraine Delia, Daughters of Suburbia: Growing Up White, Middle Class, and Female (New Brunswick, N.J., 2000).Google Scholar Interestingly, Buenos Aires office chief Russell Pierce titled the autobiographical account of his life in Argentina “Gringo Gaucho,” calling on both his insider and other status. See next note for full citation.

⁶² Pierce, Russell, Gringo Gaucho: An Advertising Odyssey (Ashland, Ore., 1991), 91.Google Scholar

⁶³ “J. Walter Thompson International,” 1952, 3.

⁶⁴ Pierce, Gringo Gaucho, 91. Regardless of his ignorance about his new home or his product, Pierce was enormously successful in Argentina. His Buenos Aires office staff grew from sixteen to thirty-four in two years, and billing almost doubled.

⁶⁵ “How Well Do You Know Your JWT'ers?” Thumbnail Sketch no. 22, J. Walter Thompson Company News, 2 June 1947, p. 6.

⁶⁶ Henry Flower at representatives' meeting, Oct. 1929, 3, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁶⁷ “J. Walter Thompson International,” 1952, 5-6.

⁶⁸ Wilkins, The Emergence of Multinational Enterprise, 97.

⁶⁹ Wilkins, The Maturing of Multinational Enterprise, 22.

⁷⁰ Ibid., 94.

⁷¹ Ibid., 129.

⁷² Representatives' meeting minutes, Aug. 1929,15.

⁷³ Representatives' meeting minutes, Oct. 1929,4, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁷⁴ Wilkins, Mira and Hill, Frank Ernest, American Business Abroad: Ford on Six Continents (Detroit, 1964), 92, 95Google Scholar; Rock, David, Argentina, 1516–1987: From Spanish Colonization to Alfonsin (Berkeley, Calif., 1985), 175, 191.Google Scholar

⁷⁵ For a map of the growth of railroads in Argentina between 1870 and 1910, see Rock, Argentina, 170.

⁷⁶ Ibid., 168.

⁷⁷ On the relationship between Argentina and Britain, see Hennessy, Alistair, “Argentines, Anglo-Argentines, and Others,” in Hennessy, Alistair and King, John, eds., The Land That England Lost: Argentina and Britain, A Special Relationship (London, 1992), 9–48.Google Scholar

⁷⁸ “Meeting in the Lecture Hall,” 21 Feb. 1934, staff meetings, 1933-34, 1. J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁷⁹ John King and Alistair Hennessy, “Introduction,” The Land That England Lost, 3.

⁸⁰ John King, “The Influence of British Culture in Argentina,” in The Land That England Lost, 167.

⁸¹ Henry Flower to representatives' meeting, 20 Aug. 1929,10, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁸² Flower to representatives' meeting, 10.

⁸³ Lewis, Daniel K., The History of Argentina (Westport, Conn., 2001), 70.Google Scholar

⁸⁴ Hennessy, “Argentines, Anglo-Argentines and Others,” 34.

⁸⁵ Trade emerged as a significant factor in the relationship between the United States and Argentina as early as 1889, when the first Pan American conference demonstrated the United States' desire to extend its trade in the Western Hemisphere. From the start, however, trade favored the United States, as tariffs as well as issues like sanitary meat conditions, widely perceived as a red herring, prevented much importation of Argentine goods into the United States. See Harding, Clarence H., Argentina and the United States (Boston, 1941).Google Scholar

⁸⁶ Flower to representatives' meeting, 20 Aug. 1929,10.

⁸⁷ “Analysis of Sufficient Extensive Time Period to Determine How Long It Takes a Feeling to Die Out,” 1930, 92, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁸⁸ Ibid., 96.

⁸⁹ Ibid., 55.

⁹⁰ On the Pan American Conferences, see Lewis, The History of Argentina, 27. It was not until the Seventh Pan American Conference, held in Montevideo in 1933, that the United States signed the Convention on Rights and Duties of States, Article 8, which stated that “no state has the right to intervene in the internal or external affairs of another.”

⁹¹ “Analysis,” 98.

⁹² Henderson, “A Short History of the J. Walter Thompson Company,” 2.

⁹³ Jose Fajardo and Andrew Billings, “Must Export Copy Go Native?” Export Advertiser (Nov. 1929): 6, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

⁹⁴ Ibid., 22.

⁹⁵ Ibid., 22.

⁹⁶ Ibid., 22.

⁹⁷ Ibid., 24.

⁹⁸ This analysis also supports Jeff Merron's argument that, in the end, simple understandings of class and gender, rather than more complex understandings of regional or cultural norms, dictated advertising content.

⁹⁹ Fajardo and Billings, “Must Export Copy Go Native?” 7.

¹⁰⁰ Ibid., 26.

¹⁰¹ Pond's Research Report, 1935, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

¹⁰² Roland Marchand, “Customer Research as Public Relations: General Motors in the 1930s,” in Getting and Spending, 103, 107.

¹⁰³ “Notes on Indian Advertising,” 1938, J. Walter Thompson Archives.

¹⁰⁴ “Walter Thompson International,” 1952, 5-6.

¹⁰⁵ Flower, representatives' meeting, 20 Aug. 1929.

¹⁰⁶ The Countess Paganini de Castano became instrumental on two campaigns: Modess and Scott toilet tissue. Her toilet-tissue campaign exposed perhaps her upper-class or cultural sensibilities, as 50 percent of the intended publications initially refused the ads, considering them in poor taste. The countess then took on the Modess campaign, deciding, as she had done with the Scott ads, to translate more or less literally the copy developed in New York. In this case, her “Diseases You Don't Talk About” campaign proved successful, and in the end only one publication refused the advertising. See Pierce, Gringo Gaucho, 262.

¹⁰⁷ On the London Office of J. Walter Thompson, and its relationship with General Motors, see West, “From T-Square to T-Plan.”

¹⁰⁸ Pierce, Gringo Gaucho, 124, 129.

¹⁰⁹ Watson, “Markets Are People,” 6.

¹¹⁰ Farlow, staff meeting minutes, 2 Feb. 1934,1.

¹¹¹ Watson, “Markets Are People,” 6.

¹¹² Ibid.

¹¹³ Bill Ricketts, representatives' meeting, 27 June 1928: 4, J. Walter Thompson Company Archives.

¹¹⁴ Jones, The Evolution of International Business, 173.

¹¹⁵ Henderson, “A Short History of the J. Walter Thompson Company,” 3.